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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Marty Hanks <marty AT justbeenc.com>
  • To: Orange County Bees <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] Dear Abbee...
  • Date: Sat, 12 Jan 2013 18:40:52 -0500

That's Awesome Lewis!

I was up at Jens this week and her hive is doing the same thing. My colony right beside her is the size of a softball and hers (3 8-frame boxes) is FULL of bees and several drones. They are cramming them in between the 2nd & 3rd box were there is usually burr comb. It was SO full. We cleaned off all the cells and are going in tomorrow w/ another super and a drone frame. 

I will say that maybe they are making drones to deal w/ Varroa. We found several drone larva at the front door so they are pulling them. When we cleaned the cells there were 1-2 varroa per cell. So this is now two colonies producing drones in January. Either way you are right...breed from those queen! 

"Dear Abbee"...what a hoot!

marty 

On Sat, Jan 12, 2013 at 5:11 PM, Lewis Cauble <lewis AT hivebody.com> wrote:

 

Dear Abbee,

I took advantage of the warm weather today and inspected a few colonies.  I've got some winners and some losers, but no surprises except for one. 

 

In bee school, they told me that all of the drones get kicked out in the fall because they are a bunch of lazy bums.  When resources start coming in to the colony in the spring, the queen will begin laying a new crop of bums.  Well, I opened a colony today and it was full of drones and drone brood.  Good news, right?  Spring must be here.  The funny thing is that I have other colonies within about 1000 ft of this colony but nary a drone or signs of drone brood in those colonies at all.  Should I move my other colonies closer to this colony to take advantage of an obviously superior micro-environment?  Should I graft off of this super queen? 

 

Enclosed please find a photo of my super queen.  

 

Sincerely, 

 

Sleepless in Cedar Grove 

      


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Marty Hanks
Just Bee, Apiaries
 
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